Charlie (65 page)

‘How are you feeling?’ Charlie asked as Dave stirred and rubbed his eyes. ‘Can I make you something to eat?’

He seemed a bit confused for a moment. He frowned at the newly ironed shirts on a clothes-horse by the fire and looked at his watch. ‘You’re still here?’

‘I’m not that easy to get rid of,’ she said with a smile. ‘Even Daphne Dexter couldn’t manage that! Now, what about food?’

Later, after a cheese omelette and chips Charlie rustled up for them both, Dave seemed much better. ‘You’re so very like Jin,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘Not just in looks, but that calm, inscrutable quality he had too. That’s good, Charlie, if you ever go into business you’ll be every bit as smart as he was.’

She told him her idea of maybe going into antiques and he smiled. ‘You’ll be a real whiz at it, I know you will. So don’t let anyone put you off.’

They talked about a great many things, of Charlie’s childhood in Dartmouth, of how she managed after Sylvia died and of Andrew. Dave told her about Wendy and her husband Martin and showed her photographs of their home in Sydney. ‘I went out there at Christmas,’ he said, his face glowing as he described her house. ‘Martin loves Grant as if he were his own kid, and they’re hoping to have a little sister for him too some day.’

‘Do they know how ill you are?’ Charlie asked.

He shook his head. ‘If I was to tell them they’d come home. I don’t want that. I’d rather they remembered me as I was.’

‘You must write and explain that then,’ she said, not liking to use the phrase ‘before it’s too late’. ‘If you don’t, she’ll be riddled with guilt if anything happens to you. She might not have someone to go and see, like I found you, to tell her about you.’

‘I wouldn’t want her talking to someone who told her such nasty things as I’ve had to tell you,’ he said with a grimace.

‘It might have been nasty, but I’m still glad I know about it,’ she said. ‘But getting back to that nastiness, can you just tell me the last part? Especially what happened to you.’

‘They left me up there,’ he said. ‘I was convinced they were going to come for me and shoot me at any minute. What with that, and the thunder and lightning, I was scared witless. Through the crack in the floor I watched the twins bundle Jin up in a tarpaulin. I heard them open the back door out on to the river, we had a rowing boat tied up out there, and they heaved him into it at high tide. I managed to wriggle over to the window and watched them. They rowed out and dumped him. I was flabbergasted at that. The river police have a station just four or five hundred yards away, but I suppose they took the risk because it was such a stormy night, and no one was likely to be out watching. When they got back, they hosed down the blood as cool as cucumbers.’

A shiver went down Charlie’s spine. If they were that calm they’d probably disposed of others before who got in their way. ‘Then what?’

‘They came for me,’ he said. ‘It was first light by then. Daphne just stood there looking down at me for some time before she even spoke. I nearly shit meself! Her brothers were covered in blood, but she looked like a bloody beauty queen, even after what she’d done. Not a speck of blood on her dress, not a hair out of place. Then she gave me her ultimatum. Forget what I’d seen, or Wendy would get it. I was to go downstairs, and open up the warehouse and start unloading as if I’d just got back with the lorry. She said she would give me further orders in a day or two. I had no choice but to agree.’

‘Of course you didn’t,’ she reassured him; faced with that predicament she thought she’d have chosen the same path. ‘But what happened about Jin’s shipment of goods?’

‘She must have got that picked up,’ he said. ‘As I hadn’t spoken to Jin I didn’t know where it was arriving or when. I reckon he must have had all the documents in his briefcase that night. Maybe that’s what he came there for, to tell me about it, or they might have picked him up somewhere else. I never found that out. I never saw his car either, so they must’ve got that too and got rid of it. So you see no one but me ever knew Jin had come back, everyone thought he was still in Holland. My business plummeted then without the work I used to get from Jin. In a few months I was in trouble. Then I got an offer for the lease of the warehouse. I knew she was behind it, but I had no choice but to let it go. I couldn’t bear to be in it anyway, not after what I’d seen happen there.’

‘So she ruined you too then?’ Charlie sighed. She felt so much for him, it must have been a living hell.

‘Not quite, I still had me trucks. I got a bit of work with them and I still had a few thousand I’d got for the lease. But then I blew most of that on Wendy’s wedding which was in the spring of ’71. You can’t imagine how glad I was when she told me they were going to emigrate. I wouldn’t have put it past Daphne to do something to Wendy just to make sure I still kept me mouth shut. I started to feel ill soon after the wedding. I sold off the trucks, and packed it all in, then I went out to see Wendy before I got too bad. Please God she’ll never see me like I am now.’

Charlie privately thought she ought to see him, but she kept that to herself.

‘Did the police ever come to see you about Jin?’ she asked instead.

‘Just once,’ he said. ‘It was just after your mum was hurt. I felt so sick about that, love. I never met her, but after knowing your dad stuck by her, right to the death, I knew she had to be pretty special. But what could I do?’ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘I just told them what I’d been instructed to say, which was the same all the blokes who worked here said too, that the last time I saw him was when he was off to Holland.’

‘Did anyone tell them Jin was expecting a shipment of goods?’ she asked. ‘It seems funny to me they never picked up on that.’ She mentioned that Hughes had found the stuff now.

‘I never said anything. The other blokes at the warehouse were just young lads who didn’t know about anything until the day it arrived. The Fuzz went through the place, but there was nothing there to see, Jin never left papers, not unless it was delivery notes for us. But that stuff was valuable, Charlie, really good stuff, jade mostly and carpets. Your dad was the main man dealing in it, so they wouldn’t have been able to sell it on easily without attracting attention. But I don’t reckon nicking his gear was her real purpose, ruining him was. If you hadn’t stuck your oar in, I expect she’d have sat on it for years, gloating over it.’

‘It was a fiendish plot,’ Charlie sighed. ‘It’s hard to believe anyone could be so ruthless.’

‘The only thing which keeps me going is the thought she’ll die in prison,’ he said with a chuckle. ‘She’ll fight everyone, she’ll get striped and worse. Soon she’ll go right off her rocker.’

Charlie knew she must go now. It was nearly nine at night and she wanted to get back before Rita. She gave Dave her telephone number. ‘If you need anything, a meal cooked for you, the flat cleaned or just a chat, call me,’ she said. ‘I can’t thank you enough for all you’ve told me.’

‘Let’s just hope I make it to the trial,’ he said with a feeble grin. ‘The police have got my sworn testimony, but I want to be there to see that woman go down. I just wish they hadn’t abolished hanging.’

‘Me too,’ Charlie agreed. ‘I’d gladly put the noose around her neck myself.’

She leaned over him to kiss him, and he caught her face in his two big hands and held it for a moment looking at her. ‘You’re your father’s daughter all right,’ he said. ‘He put me on the straight road, away from crime. Whatever comes up in that trial, you just hold your head up, love. He were a good man. One of the best. Keep that in your head, and follow the instinct he’s given you. He’ll be watching over you.’

Chapter Twenty-one

The Dexters’ trial began at the Old Bailey on 2 April 1973. Charlie’s nineteenth birthday had passed back in February, Andrew’s twenty-first just a week ago, but they hadn’t celebrated either occasion. They were waiting for the outcome of the trial.

It had been six long, tense months, starting with Jin’s funeral down in Dartmouth. Charlie had imagined that burying her father alongside her mother in the town he had loved would ease the pain of losing him, and finalize everything, but instead it released a new deluge of grief for both her parents.

Ivor comforted her by saying she’d bottled up her real feelings about them from the time when Sylvia was attacked and Jin didn’t return home: he said it was good that she was allowing all that hurt and sorrow to come to the surface at last. Charlie thought he was probably right, but that cold, grey October day of the funeral was the start of a long, bleak winter. She coped with her sorrow by working long hours at Haagman’s and two nights a week at a business studies class. Keeping busy and avoiding looking back was Rita’s way of getting through bad times. Charlie found it worked for her too.

Andrew had moved into the house in Sinclair Grove in Brent with his three friends, but Charlie had remained living with Rita. This was partly to appease Mr and Mrs Blake, who held the belief that unmarried couples sharing a house were ‘living in sin’, partly so that Andrew would have fewer distractions from his studies, but mostly for Rita’s sake. Back in November she had told her parents the full story about her part in the impending trial, and urged them to tell Paul she was his real mother. As she had half expected they showed no sympathy or understanding, but flew into a rage and demanded she get out of their house and never come back. Since then Rita had written them many pleading letters, but they returned them all unopened. Charlie felt compelled to stay with her then – Rita had been there for her when she needed support and Charlie wanted to help her now.

She had been very touched when a letter arrived at Haagman’s from Meg, Beth and Anne. They had read about her father’s body being found and felt they had to write and offer their condolences. There was a paragraph from each of them – Anne and Beth urged her to get in touch, maybe meet up for a drink sometime; Meg said simply that she was very sorry for all the hurt she’d caused her; that she knew Charlie wouldn’t ever want to see her again, but just the same she wanted her to know how much she felt for her about her father.

Charlie wrote back to thank them. She wasn’t sure yet whether she’d keep in touch, but it felt good to know they hadn’t forgotten the good times they’d shared, and that Meg did have a heart after all.

Dave Kent was getting sicker week by week, but he remained stubbornly determined to give his evidence at the trial. An unlikely friendship had grown between him and Charlie in odd evenings they spent together at his flat, unbeknown to Andrew or Rita who thought she was off at another class. Maybe she was a substitute daughter for Dave, and he was a substitute father for her, but through his many amusing, gritty stories about the years he worked with Jin, Charlie had found the solace she needed and an understanding of both men’s characters.

While Dave had been quick to point out that Jin had always been the brains behind their operation and he merely the brawn, they had both learned new skills by working together. Dave had taught Jin to drive a lorry, Jin had taught Dave simple bookkeeping and to appreciate the beauty of his artefacts. Although Jin wasn’t exactly one of the lads, he hadn’t been as aloof as Charlie had imagined. He helped with loading and unloading and always mucked in with the cleaning up, making tea and other mundane chores. But it was hearing about the boyish side of her father that touched Charlie the most. Dave, laughing, described a time when Jin let off Chinese crackers in the empty warehouse, and how the men leapt around yelling as the whizzing, crackling fireworks came at them. One hot afternoon he goaded all the lads into jumping into the river with him for a swim, then doubled back, locked the warehouse doors with their clothes inside, and left them no choice but to run naked around the side of the building to retrieve them.

She learned too of Jin’s youth, of how as a young boy, alone in Hong Kong, he wheedled his way into working for English naval officers and their families, just so he could learn from them. His fierce ambition to get to England drove him to take any job, however tough. By day he cleaned houses, tended gardens, ran errands, at night he worked in bars, saving every penny he made. It was clear to Charlie that Jin had been a great influence on Dave, that once he discovered Jin’s youth had been far grimmer than his own, he tried to emulate the man’s honesty, good manners and dignity.

But the hardest part of the past six months had been having so little time to spend with Andrew. It wasn’t enough just being with him from Friday night till Sunday morning, then it was all fiery passion but no chance really to relax and talk. If he was anxious about the trial, he didn’t speak of it, and she had the added burden of keeping all she’d learned from Dave about her father from him and Rita too.

‘Penny for them?’ Rita asked as they travelled to work together on the Central Line on the morning of 2 April. As always the rush-hour tube was packed solid, and the girls were pressed up tight against each other.

‘I was just thinking that in a couple of hours the jury will be sworn in,’ Charlie admitted.

‘I bet Daphne’s pooping her pants right now,’ Rita giggled. ‘Being stuck in Holloway all these months must have brought her down a peg or two. I doubt she got a chance to lord it over anyone there.’

‘Part of me wishes I wasn’t a witness at all, or working, so I could sit through the whole thing and give her the evil eye,’ Charlie said with a trace of wistfulness.

They both knew the trial might last for weeks. As Detective Inspector Hughes had hoped, other victims had come forward in the past few months. In all probability Dave and Rita’s vital evidence would be heard early in the trial, but Charlie and Andrew’s, being less important, would mean they might have a long wait.

‘I don’t. I want my chance to speak out,’ Rita said firmly. ‘I just hope they call me quickly. I’m so jumpy I don’t think I’ll be able to eat or sleep until it’s over.’

On an impulse Charlie kissed her friend’s cheek. ‘What’s that for?’ Rita sniggered.

‘For being so brave,’ Charlie said simply. Today was the first time Rita had admitted how jumpy she was, yet she’d already been through so much. One of the worst things was having to submit to being photographed naked. Charlie thought she would die of embarrassment if pictures of her body were to be passed around the court, but Rita had even managed to laugh and joke about that.